Prof. Dr. Anne Nassauer

• Social Order, Social Change, and Sustainability
• Culture, Motivation, and (Symbolic Inter-)Action
• Socialization, Collective Dynamics, and Civil Society
• Deviant and Antisocial Behavior and Societal Responses
• Qualitative and Mixed Methods, and Research Ethics
   

Ongoing

• Rampage School Shootings: Social influence and excessive violence at school
• Collective Rule Breaking: From individual cognition to crowd dynamics (with Jens Krause, Marcel Brass, and Pawel Romanzcuk, Humboldt University Berlin)
• Civil society action in authoritarian regimes (with Ralph Hertwig, Max Planck Institute for Human Development)
• Integrating a cognitive and collective behavior perspective on behavioral contagion: developing decision models for artificial agents in VR (SCIoI Grant with Marcel Brass, Jens Krause, and Pawel Romanczuk, Humboldt Universität zu Berlin)
• Video Data Analysis: Recent developments and application in the social sciences (research project in cooperation with Nicolas M. Legewie, University of Münster)

Completed

• An analysis of body camera videos of shootings by US police (research project as visiting researcher at Yale University 2019 & 2020, funded by the Fritz Thyssen Foundation)
• Collective Violence in Germany and the USA: Protest, Insurrection and the Police (Research project as Junior Professor at Freie Universität Berlin)
• Failed interaction rituals: An analysis of armed robberies using surveillance camera videos (research project as a postdoctoral researcher at Freie Universität Berlin)
• Development of a methodological approach for video analysis in the 21st century (research project in cooperation with Nicolas Legewie, University of Erfurt)
• Subterranean Politics in Germany: Occupy, Anonymous, Guttenplag (research project under the direction of Helmut Anheier, Hertie School of Governance)
• National and Transnational Spread of Social Movement Tactics (research project with Bogdan Vasi, University of Iowa, as visiting researcher at Columbia University 2010 & 2011, stay funded by the Berlin Graduate School of Social Sciences

• 2021 Outstanding Recent Contribution in Social Psychology Award of the American Sociological Association, Section of Social Psychology for "Situational Breakdowns: Understanding Protest Violence and Other Surprising Outcomes"(Oxford University Press, 2019).
• 2020 Outstanding Contribution to Political Sociology 2020 Honourable Mention of the American Sociological Association, Political Sociology Section for "Situational Breakdowns: Understanding Protest Violence and Other Surprising Outcomes"(Oxford University Press, 2019).
• 2020 Charles Horton Cooley Book Award of the Society for the Study of Symbolic Interaction (SSSI) for "Situational Breakdowns: Understanding Protest Violence and Other Surprising Outcomes" (Oxford University Press, 2019).

In the media (selection)

• Guest in the Podcast “Back to School Shootings”, Episode 54 “School shooter felt ‘my only friend was my gun’” August 22, 2025 (60-minute interview, available on Spotify, as well as here)
• Guest in the Podcast “Back to School Shootings”, Episode 36 “School shooters are bad at killing. We can make them even worse.” March 21, 2025 (60-minute interview, available on Spotify, as well as here)
• Appearance as an expert on violence and collective behaviour in Terra X documentary "Schlaue Schwärme - Rätselhafte Kräfte" (ZDF, directed by Iris Gesang), from minute 30, March 12, 2023, available in the ZDF media centre.
• Interview with Wall Street Journal, article:"The Trump Organisation's Political Prosecution" (Topic: Donald Trump's emotions on election night), February 06, 2021.
• Interview with States, Power, and Societies - ASA Political Sociology Section Newsletter, article: "Interview with Dr Anne Nassauer, Honorable Mention Distinguished Contribution to Scholarships Award for her book 'Situational Breakdowns: Understanding Protest Violence and Other Surprising Outcomes' (Oxford 2019)", December 20, 2020.
• Interview with FiveThirtyEight, article: "De-escalation Keeps Protesters And Police Safer. Departments Respond With Force Anyway" (Topic: Protest Violence), June 01, 2020.
• Interview with WIRED, Article: "Curfews Can Quell Violence-but Also Spark More Protests" (Topic: Protest Violence), June 04 2020.
• Twelve books that give context to current protests [reading list], Oxford University Press Blog, mentions, among others, "Situational Breakdowns: Understanding Protest Violence and Other surprising outcomes", June 03 2020.
• "Order, breakdown and the dynamics of protest violence", 45-minute live interview on the book "Situational Breakdowns: Understanding Protest Violence and Other Surprising Outcomes" (Oxford University Press, 2019) with US radio show "This is Hell", September 21, 2019.
• Interview with Commercial Appeal (USA Today Network), "Experts raise questions about police response to Frayser protest" (topic: protest violence), June 12, 2019.
• Guest article in ZócaloPublic Square (and SmithsonianOnlineMagazine): "How Scientists Can Learn About Human Behaviour From Closed-Circuit TV" (topic: recent video data and analysis), September 07, 2018.
• Interview with DIE ZEIT, article: "Vorbild Berlin?" (topic: protest violence), June 12, 2017.
• Interview with FU magazine FURIOS, article: "There is no simple explanation" (topic: school rampages), July 10, 2017.
• Interview with Wall Street Journal, article[KD5] : "Rating a Semi-Accidental President" (Topic: Donald Trump's emotions on election night), April 25, 2017

• Nassauer, A. & Legewie, N. M. (2022). Video Data Analysis: How to Use 21st Century Video in the Social Sciences.
  Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publishing.
• Nassauer, A. (2019).Situational Breakdowns: Understanding Protest Violence and other Surprising Outcomes. New York: Oxford University Press.

• Nassauer, A. (2025). “Race, Racism, and Rampage: Rethinking School Shootings Through a Racial Lens”. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 1-22. Online first: https://doi.org/10.1080/01419870.2025.2558988
• Nassauer, A. (2025). “The only friend I had was my gun’: A mixed-methods study of gun culture in school shootings." PLOS ONE. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0322195
• Nassauer, A. (2024). "The Interactional Pathways of Mass Killings: Toward a novel understanding of rampage school shootings". Symbolic Interaction. Online First.
• Nassauer, A. (2024)."Two Processes of Dehumanisation: an in-depth study of racial biases in real-life officer-involved shootings of black citizens." Ethnic and Racial Studies. 47(1): 234-257.
• William N.S. Arlidge, Robert Arlinghaus, Ralf H.J.M. Kurvers, Anne Nassauer, Rodrigo Oyanedel & Jens Krause (2023). “Situational Social Influence Leading to Non-compliance with Conservation Rules.Trends in Ecology and Evolution.” 38(12): 1154-1164.
• Legewie, N. M. & Nassauer, A (2023). "Current and Future Debates in Video Data Analysis."Sociological Methods & Research 52 (3): 1107-1119.
• Legewie, N. M. & Nassauer, A (guest editors, equal contribution, 2023). Special Issue: "The Present and Future of Video-based Social Science Research". Sociological Methods and Research, Volume 52, Issue 3.
• Nassauer, A. (2022). "Situation, Context, and Causality - On a Core Debate of Violence Research." Violence: An International Journal 3(1):40-64.
• Nassauer, A. (2022). "Video Data Analysis as a Tool for Studying Escalation Processes: The Case of Police Use of Force." Historical Social Research 47(1):36-57.
• Krause, J., P. Romanczuk, E. Cracco, W. Arlidge, A. Nassauer & M. Brass (2021) “Collective Rule-Breaking.” Trends in Cognitive Sciences 25 (12): 1082-1095.
• Nassauer, A. (2021)."Whose Streets? Our Streets! Negotiations of Space and Collective Violence." Social Problems 68 (4): 852-869.
• Nassauer, A. & Legewie, N. M. (2021, co-authors). "Video Data Analysis: A Methodological Frame for a Novel Research Trend." Sociological Methods and Research, 50(1): 135-174 (online first since 2018).
• Nassauer, A. & Legewie, N. M. (2020, co-authors). "Methodological Developments in Violence Research - Video Data Analysis, Mixed Methods and Big Data". Austrian Journal of Sociology 45:135-156.
• Nassauer, A. & Legewie, N. M. (2019, co-authors). “Analysing 21st Century Video Data on Situational Dynamics-Issues and Challenges in Video Data Analysis.” Social Sciences 8(3):100.
• Nassauer, A. & Legewie, N. M. (2018, co-authors)."YouTube, Google, Facebook: 21st Century Online Video Research and Research Ethics." Forum: Qualitative Social Research. 19:03, Art. 32.
• Nassauer, A. (2018). "Situational Dynamics and the Emergence of Violence During Protests." Psychology of Violence. 8(3):293-304.
• Nassauer, A. & Vasi, I. B. (2018). "On Carrots and Mobs. The Transnational Diffusion of a Collective Ethical Consumption Tactic." Acta Sociologica. 61(4): 356-373.
• Nassauer, A. (2018). "How Robberies Succeed or Fail: Analysing Crime Caught on CCTV." Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency. 55(1): 125-154.
• Nassauer, A. (2016). "Theoretical considerations on the emergence of violence in protests: A situational mechanism explanation." Berliner Journal für Soziologie. 25: 491-518.
• Nassauer, A. (2016). "From Peaceful Marches to Violent Clashes: A Micro-Situational Analysis." Social Movement Studies. 15(5): 515-530.
• Nassauer, A. (2015). "Effective Crowd Policing: Empirical Insights on Avoiding Violence." Policing: An International Journal of Police Strategies & Management, 38(1): 3-23.
• Nassauer, A. (2010). "From Hate to Collective Violence - Research and Practical Implications."Journal of Hate Studies, 9(1).

• Nassauer, A. (2022). "School shootings: the social dynamics of mental disorder", in Marta Elliott (ed.), Research Handbook on Society and Mental Health.  Edward Elgar Publishing.
• Nassauer, A. (2022). "Escalation during large demonstrations. Pathways to violence and ways of avoiding violence", In Bernd Bürger (ed.) The Role of the Police at Assemblies: Theory and Practice. Wiesbaden: Springer.
• Nassauer, A. & Legewie, N. M. (2020, co-authors). "Violent Livestreams as Data? The 2019 Christchurch Attack Livestream as a Case Study in Research Ethics", in Shing-Ling S. Chen and Zhoujun J. Chen, Nicolas Allaire (eds.), Legal and Ethical Issues of Live Streaming.  Oxford: Lexington Publishing.
• Nassauer, A. & Legewie, N. M. (2020, co-authors)."How COVID-19 Could Help Social Science Researchers", Oxford University Press's Academic Insights for the Thinking World (OUPBlog).
• Nassauer, A. (2019). "Documenting Dissent: US Mainstream Media Reports versus Activists' Capture and Representation of Protests", in Ulla Haselstein, Frank Kelleter, Alexander Starre, and Birte Wege (eds.), American Counter/Publics. Heidelberg: Winter Verlag.
• Legewie, N. M., Nassauer, A. & M. Stuerznickel (2019). "Opportunities for Analysing Visual Data in the 21st Century. Report from the 2019 Blankensee Colloquium on Capturing and Analysing Social Change", Social Science Research Network (SSNR) 1-28.
• Nassauer, A. (2019). "Space and Collective Violence", in Fabien Jobard and Daniel Schönpflug (eds.), Political Violence in Urban Space. Berlin: De Gruyter.
• Nassauer, A. (2019). "Video surveillance footage shows how rare violence really is",Oxford University Press's Academic Insights for the Thinking World (OUPBlog).
• Nassauer, A. (2019) "A Review of James Jasper's 'The Emotions of Protest'", Soziopolis.
• Nassauer, A. (2017). "Polizei und Protest - Einsatzplanung und situative Strategien zur Gewaltvermeidung", in Annelie Molapisi, Michael Neumann, Rainer Prätorius (eds.), Die Freunde der Helfer. Police policy in uncertain times. Frankfurt: Publishing house for police science.
• Nassauer, A. (2015). "Developing a Micro-Situational Theory of Crowd Violence", in Elizabeth Crespo Kebler(ed.), Cultures, Social Bonds and the Dynamics of Violence. Oxfordshire: Inter-Disciplinary Press.
• Nassauer, A. (2015). "Forward Panic and Police Riots", in Marco Gerster, Steffen Krämer, and Daniel Ziegler (eds.), Framing Excessive Violence - Discourse and Dynamics. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
• Nassauer, A. & Anheier, H. (2015). "The 'Swarm Intelligence' and Occupy: Recent Subterranean Politics in Germany", in Kaldor, Mary and Sabine Selchow (eds.), Subtearranean Politics in Europe. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
• Nassauer, A. (2012). “Violence in Demonstrations: A Comparative Analysis of Situational Interaction Dynamics at Social Movement Protests.” Dissertation, Humboldt University of Berlin.
• Nassauer, A. & Labigne, A. (co-authors). (2012). "Violence in Civil Society. Insights from the CIVICUS Civil Society Index Databases", in Wolfgang Dörner and Regina List (eds.), Civil Society, Conflict and Violence. London: Bloomsbury Academic.

American Journal of Sociology / American Sociological Review / Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) / Sociological Methods & Research / European Sociological Review / Oxford University Press / University of California Press / Sociological Theory / Current Sociology / Social Movement Studies / Social Problems / International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health / Journal of Peace Research / Time & Society / Policing & Society / Deviant Behaviour / The British Journal of Politics and International Relations / Journal of International Studies / Psychology of Violence / Violence: An International Journal / Police Practice and Research: An International Journal / Civil Wars / Journal of Policing, Intelligence and Counter-Terrorism / Peace & Conflict: Journal of Peace Psychology / Qualitative Criminology / Intelligence and Counter Terrorism, Democracy and Security / Peace and Conflict Studies / Anthropology: Southern Africa / Visual Studies / Applied Sciences / Recent Patents in Engineering / Berliner Journal für Soziologie.